


And woke to find her hopes betrayed

by steelneena



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Sad sad sad, Ugh, corvo is such a rich character and dishonored is such a rich game, introspective, post Dishonored 2, the corvo play through
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-12
Updated: 2019-12-12
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:48:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21773218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/steelneena/pseuds/steelneena
Summary: After it's all over, Emily asks what happened, and Corvo says he'll tell her. But, when it finally comes time, finding the words is more difficult that he expected.
Relationships: Corvo Attano & Emily Kaldwin, Corvo Attano/Jessamine Kaldwin, Emily Kaldwin & Jessamine Kaldwin
Comments: 2
Kudos: 34





	And woke to find her hopes betrayed

**Author's Note:**

> I live for Mute!Corvo, but unfortunately this is not that. Because D2. but if/when I write something from D1, I will be doing that. 
> 
> Meanwhile, enjoy pain. 
> 
> Thanks to Senor_Sparklefingers for the beta.
> 
> As to the title and the poem - It's common knowledge these days that Mary kept Percy's heart with her always (it was found in her desk, wrapped in linens) after he died. Thought it...fit.

Oh, come to me in dreams, my love!

I will not ask a dearer bliss;

Come with the starry beams, my love,

And press mine eyelids with thy kiss.

’Twas thus, as ancient fables tell,

Love visited a Grecian maid,

Till she disturbed the sacred spell,

And woke to find her hopes betrayed.

But gentle sleep shall veil my sight,

And Psyche’s lamp shall darkling be,

When, in the visions of the night,

Thou dost renew thy vows to me.

Then come to me in dreams, my love,

I will not ask a dearer bliss;

Come with the starry beams, my love,

And press mine eyelids with thy kiss.

_Stanzas ["Oh, come to me in dreams, my love!"]_ by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

When Emily comes to, she asks what happened.

He says he’ll tell her.

He does. Sort of.

_Delilah’s gone, Emily. You’re safe. I promise._

After that, they don’t speak of it.

Corvo is used to her curious nature. As a child, she’d had endless queries of himself, of Jessamine, of anyone within range who might be expected to have an answer to a question, simply because they were an adult. Her mind had always been a whirlwind of wonder, so, when, once they’ve resettled into their lives, he figures she’ll pester him for the details. It’s in her natural after all.

Except, she doesn’t.

There’s no questions at all. Emily simply sits heavily on her throne and it is a little more than worrisome.

 _She’s tired_ , Corvo thinks. _She’ll come round._

She doesn’t.

It’s been weeks, burgeoning on a month, and their lives are hectic to say the least. While Corvo has never actually tended to matters of state, he certainly has enough paperwork under his purview, especially as Delilah did more than her fair share of damage to Dunwall in the short amount of time during which she reigned. The city needs to be made safe again, and his job is more than just protecting the Regent. The Regent _is_ the Nation, and, to a small scale, Dunwall, and so, securing the safety of Dunwall, and the Nation, is also his job.

Atop it, he still has to follow Emily wherever she goes. Not that that’s a hardship – _never –_ merely, it means that, though he doesn’t tend to matters of state, Emily does, and so while her time is taken up with that job, his is taken up by both.

So, for a while, he forgets to be worried that she hasn’t asked. He forgets, because he simply hasn’t had time to worry at all.

There isn’t enough of it as it is.

And then, the missive arrives from Karnaca, bearing the Duke’s seal, and Corvo finds that it’s impossible to forget now, because whether or not Emily will ask, it is his responsibility to tell her.

It begins with the discussion about Duke Luca Abele’s rather…sudden and uncharacteristic alteration of policy. It begins with Emily’s imperiously raised brow and the acutely subtle quirk of her lips (left over from the days when she watched her mother at work) and a purposefully over enunciated version of his title.

“Lord Protector.”

Not quite a statement, not quite a question. A command and an inquiry in one. A master at her craft.

“Yes, My Empress?”

“Care to explain what in the Void this might be? _Perchance?_ ”

“That depends,” he hedges, deadpan.

“Depends?”

“Do you require me to explain it?”

Emily purses her lips. He’s never been one for words. Never. Or, at least, he’d never had a chance to choose.

 _You’re not worth words, boy. You’re not worth listening to. Only thing what matter is what you can_ do _, you hear me?_

He’d heard. More than that, he’d listened. So, words went the same way as dreams: carried off on the wind into the nothingness of the blue, blue Karnacan sky, just like his Beatrici. Somewhere along the line, he found that he was actually more comfortable merging into the shadows anyways. They, at least, were relatively safe, if you knew how to use them to your advantage. And Corvo? Corvo had learned.

(Corvo learned, first on the streets, then, in the ring, determined to make something of what he’d been given: a will to survive.)

So, when his daughter – _his Empress –_ asks him to explain, despite the fact that he’d only just been worried sick about her lack of curiosity about such matters, despite the fact that he’d never denied an answer to _any_ of her questions, no matter how inane they were as a child, or invasive as an adult (The mere _honor_ in being allowed to be a father to her – in all respects: physical and intellectual alike – had instilled that drive in him, aside from the fact that he’d long ago been conditioned to answer to those to whom he’d been bequeathed.) he wants suddenly, more than _anything_ else, _not_ to be required to give an answer.

He may be her father, but She is his Empress, and he is bound to the Kaldwin line and will not disobey them.

(Maybe, someday, he’ll consider what that means. Maybe, someday, he’ll consider what it says about him. He knows when it stopped being a directive and began being a choice. But not today. He’s an old man, but not that old. Not yet.)

“Father…”

He cannot deny her.

They secret away to his chambers, and he sits her down, carefully, on the edge of the bed, slumping into his armchair with a glass of whiskey, and closes his eyes heavily, leaning his head back on the chair. In the air, the smoke from the fireplace _almost_ carries with it the spice of one of Jessamine’s so favoured cigars, and his heart _aches_ at the reminder. At the loss.

He feels thin, like someone’s taken his heart and carved a slice away from it, stuck it back, let it heal, only to remove it once more and repeat the whole process over again. Except, this time, it hasn’t healed. This time, he feels it weeping in his chest.

“Father?”

This time, there’s worry in her voice, and he cracks his eyes open slowly, exhaling heavily, as though he did have a lungful of smoke. (Maybe that’s where Jessamine’s soul resides now. In every breath he’ll ever take. He’s always been heavy with longing for her, but it’s worse now; he’s slowed down by the weight of it.)

“I miss your mother.”

It’s a simple statement, but it’s the truth.

He breathes a bit easier for it.

(Maybe he exhales her, then, into the space between he and their daughter. Maybe he’ll be free of – but he doesn’t want to be, and inhales her back, safe _safe.)_

When he finally gets up the courage to look her in the face, he sees confusion there, however briefly, but she schools her expression with all the poise of the Empress that she is. It’s a stare down that ensues, much like they used to when she was a child and wanted something desperately that he was equally unwilling to relinquish.

(Like chocolate cake _before_ dinner.)

“I miss mother, too,” she ends up saying, a little abruptly, if stilted. The question at the end is implied, but Corvo still doesn’t feel like replying. There are some things that children should never have to hear from their parents. There are some things that children should never have to experience. (Emily has experienced far too many of those things.)

Corvo sighs again, setting the glass down, undrunk. The clink of the glass and the swish of the amber liquid are far too loud in the patient silence of the room. If Emily got one thing from her mother, it’s certainly her ability to be patient when and _only_ when it serves her purposes. She could certainly do with a little more of _his_ style of patience when it comes to training, but he’s distracting himself now, from what’s important.

Distracting himself from the truth.

“I know you do, sweetheart.”

Another long pause distances them, and he can almost feel her gaze attempting to pull him back.

“So…Duke Abele…?”

Back to the matter at hand.

“’Luca’ will no longer be a problem,” he states blandly. “We’ve reached an agreement.”

“’We’?” she asks. “Since when do you have a hand in policy making? I thought you told me that no one ever knew you were even there.”

“Officially, I wasn’t.” Corvo sits forward, resting his elbows on his knees, steepleing his fingers. “Officially, the Duke’s double was found raving, insisting that _he_ was the Duke. Officially, he’s been remanded to…private care. Officially, nothing changed at all.”

“And unofficially?”

He can feel the wry smile that grows across his weathered features against his will. “Unofficially, I approached the Duke’s double and we had a conversation about what was best for the future of Karnaca, one lowly Serkonan to another, and decided that Luca wasn’t it. At least, not the Luca that _had_ been in charge.”

“I see.”

“It’s conditional, of course. Contingent on the fact that we –“ he pauses to amend his statement. “That _you_ are willing to look into the issues there, to work fairly with him and his council, that you listen and make decisions that will benefit all.”

“And you told him that I would, I suppose.”

Corvo glares at her, if playfully. As a father – even a _secret_ father – he’s allowed that much, at least. “Yes. I did.”

“A little above your station, wouldn’t you say?”

He knows what she’s trying to do, now, knows how she trying to lighten his dour mood. There’s never been a time that she hadn’t at least taken his opinion on an issue into consideration. Often, she’s asked when he hasn’t offered. If some think that he has undue influence…well…the difference is that the advice he’s provided is impartial at best. Sometimes, he doesn’t have any to give. While he’s never been one for mixing in political affairs, his understanding of them _has_ unintentionally grown over time. Once, he wouldn’t have formed an opinion at all.

(That was before Jessamine.)

“Perhaps. It’s true what they say about me, you know,” he replies, lightly, as if to say _I’ll be okay_.

And maybe he will be.

(Maybe.)

“So, I’ll be dealing with…someone more like you, then? Someone of a less aristocratic brood?” Emily appears to contemplate the thought, not requiring a reply. “There could be benefit in that.”

It’s an understatement, Corvo knows, and he’s quick to reassure her. “He’s been in court long enough that he knows the ins and outs as well as Luca did. You won’t have to worry on that front. He’s an admirable actor, and no one left in the inner circle is likely to make a fuss about his rather abrupt turnabout in direction. Anyone of suspicious intentions has been…made obsolete.”

It’s Emily’s turn to smile wryly. “Let me guess. It’s better I don’t know.”

“What you don’t know, can’t be turned against you in this case, so long as no one knows that I know it, and, well, I wasn’t there, remember?”

Emily’s smile turns into a full on grin, but their light banter fades away quickly as the topic falters. Regardless, Emily still looks on expectantly. There’s more, and she knows it, that much is evident. There’s more and Corvo is still reluctant to share. She knows that too.

“What’s bothering you, father?”

In the flickering of the firelight, the miniscule muscle twitches in his face are obscured. It keeps her from reading him like a book. Most couldn’t anyways, but Emily has always been intuitive. Emily had always been observant, and particularly attuned to his moods, from childhood on. Once, it was precocious. Now, it often serves her well in the myriad hurdles that the daily trail of Court sends her way.

“You’ve always been recalcitrant, father, but…” Concern is a bird alight in her expression, flitting warily.

“I’m just tired.”

It’s only half a lie.

He hopes against all hope that she’ll believe it.

“I know you’re tired. I am too, but…” Emily leaves the statement hanging and Corvo knows, somehow, that she doesn’t expect him to answer. That this, whatever it is, is something so deeply personal that giving voice to it before another person is almost more than he can bear.

And yet, for all he wishes to jealously cling to Jessamine, Corvo knows that he can’t.

“Do you remember when I was imprisoned?” he asks, quite surprising himself and Emily alike. “Do you remember hearing talk about my escape, before I rescued you?” Emily can only nod, as if to break his words with her own might change his mind.

(It might.)

He lifts the glass to his lips and sips the golden liquid, letting it burn his throat raw as it goes down. Afterwords, his voice is husky. “Do you remember how they sent me out on missions? The ‘loyalists’ who wanted to put you back on the throne. Havelock and the like?” Another nod. “I did whatever it took to get you back. Whatever needed to be done, I did. But I didn’t do it alone.”

Suddenly, Emily’s hands are grasping his. He doesn’t know when she moved, but she did, quick as a shadow and just as quiet, her nimble fingers push away the covering over his hand, revealing the mark. Tenderly, she caresses the thin, dark skin there.

“The Outsider,” she breathes with trepidatious reverence.

“Yes.” The knowledge has never been expressly forbidden, but long it’s gone unstated between them, as if by not expressing it, they deny its existence altogether.

No longer.

“You never told me, but…”

“You knew.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t worship him. He chose me. Gave me the means to save you. Both times.”

“And?” she cocks her head at him, noticing that waver in his brow he’s tried so, so hard to rid himself of.

“And he gave me back your mother.” 

(He wants to add _and took her away, too_ , but he can’t, because that’s not true. It wasn’t the Outsider who did that. It was him.)

The fire crackles warmly beside them, a comforting sound, homey and full of memories. It crackles and crackles and it doesn’t pause, heedless of the serious silence that ought to fill the moment. The fire doesn’t care about the past. The fire doesn’t care about their feelings. All it knows is primal, all it is is action. Corvo knows what it is to be the fire. (Corvo wishes, sometimes, that he could be that way again, without bearing the great cost that comes of it, eating away at his conscious.)

The fire is warm, but Emily is not.

Her hands on his are the chill of death. Her hands on his are stone.

“ _How_.”

Instinctively, the fingers of his left hand curl under, as if he were holding the strange muscle of her heart under his hand, ready to be caressed, pumped, bloodless, to reveal the secrets of the world around them. It is a phantom between his fingers, slipping carelessly away from his futile grasp. There is no half-life for Jessamine any more.

“Magic. Arcane rituals that bound her to her heart, whispering in my mind when I held it. Secrets. Truths. Soft consolations.”

_Endearments._

Finally, he gathers the courage to look into his daughter's eyes. He’s gone against all odds so many times, fought his way up from nothing once, twice, three times all told, all alone, and yet, this is the most difficult thing he has ever had to do.

Disappointing Emily is always the hardest thing he has ever had to do.

Her soft brown eyes fill with anguish, and he can feel the sharp sting that his betrayal (he doesn’t know why it feels like a betrayal; it just does.) has on her.

“Emily…”

“Did she talk about me?”

Corvo wracks his brain, sifts through the memories; long, he tried to memorize each word, down to the syllable, that she ever uttered. “She wasn’t like that…it was…she was vague. Once, perhaps…a memory about the finest potted whale meat…” he shakes his head sadly. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’m so sorry.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

(He’d considered it, of course. But then he’d discovered that no one else could see it – save Aramis Stilton, of course – and that changed things. What he wouldn’t have given, many, many times, to have shared the bittersweet remains of his beloved Jessamine with their daughter. What he wouldn’t have given to see her face light up. And yet, perhaps, it’s better this way. Perhaps it’s better that she didn’t have to suffer her mother’s protracted existence, a half-formed thing of Void and darkness and affection, decayed, yet not decaying in his hand.)

In the end, there’s no answer he can give her that would be sufficient. There’s no answer he can provide that won’t end in her tears.

_I didn’t want to hurt you._

_I didn’t want to hurt me._

_I didn’t want to share._

Any of them are accurate enough.

“Father-“

There’s a whine in her voice, one that he hasn’t heard since she was a little girl who ran about in a cream child-sized suit, begging him to play hide-and-go seek, and she pulls away. Any imagined pain he holds in heart is miniscule by comparison.

Instinctively, he reaches back for her, regardless of the way her fingers curl under at his attempt.

“Emily, please…“ But he doesn’t know what to say. He’s never known what to say. He had no words for her when Jessamine died. He had no words for her when he saved her, and no words for her when she asked him what would happen next. Inevitably, Emily had always filled the silence herself; half coping mechanism, half habitual, considering the most he was likely to give her even before that was a few quiet words and a small smile.

He remembers the day Jessamine told her that she was his daughter. That he was her father. How she _reached_ for him, how she said the word _‘daddy’_ with such wonder, her eyes wide, such absolute and utter _love_. He wishes she would look at him like that now.

(She doesn’t.)

Her eyes are watering, her expression stern, her posture rigid.

(The Isles are flourishing. Things are prosperous once more. No one questions her rule. _No one._ )

“Goodnight, Father,” she says stiffly as she rises from where she’d knelt on the floor.

(The Isles are flourishing. Things are prosperous once more. No one questions her rule. _Not even he._ )

When she turns and leaves, it’s all he can do to set the glass aside, to stand, to reach out, to say her name, his own eyes glassy.

And, miraculously, she turns.

“I love you, Emily.”

A beat.

Two.

“I love you too, Father.”

It isn’t warm. It isn’t vibrant, and full of wonder. It isn’t _‘daddy’_.

It’s a start.


End file.
